Finding Clarity (In a Foggy World)

If you find yourself wrestling with a difficult or complex decision that really matters, or are just feeling like you need clarity in some area of your professional or personal life, this article might help.

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One of our family's more memorable trips together was to British Columbia, in southwestern Canada, for a week of skiing at the spectacular Whistler-Blackcomb resort.

The week was everything we hoped for; the skiing—and more importantly, the time away with the family—was amazing. The skiing was amazing, that is, except for approximately half of one day. The problem we encountered could be summed up in one word.

Fog.

The photo below doesn't even begin to do our morning of fog at Whistler justice. That day, when the fog was at its worst, it would have been pointless to take a photo. While skiing, we couldn't see the ski lifts, we couldn't see other skiers unless they were within feet of us, and we couldn't even see the trees, unless we were about to run into one. We absolutely could not see the left and right boundaries of the trails we were skiing. Even my fearless kids skied slowly. Well, more slowly than usual, anyway.

If you ski, you may have experienced a day like this. The interesting thing about the fog on that day, however, was that it started about 1/3 of the way down the mountain. At the top, there was nothing but gorgeous blue sky and sunshine.

So we would start our run down the mountain and everything would be great; beautiful bright white snow and snow-covered trees set against an impossibly blue sky. We were in control, and we knew what was coming next.

Then we entered the fog and everything changed. We couldn't see what was ahead of us and we couldn't see what was coming at us from behind. We couldn't see the bumps ahead. We couldn't see the hazards lurking. We had very little sense of which way we should go. Nothing felt clear. At one point during that morning, I stopped in a relatively flat area to try to see where I should go next, and realized that if I had not remembered where I had just come from, I couldn't have even told you which way was up.

Sometimes life (or business) can be like that. Everything is sailing (or skiing) along smoothly. You have clarity, direction, and a sense that things are going well. And then the fog rolls in.

Perhaps it is the fog that comes in the aftermath of a big decision—whether the decision turned out to be great or terrible. Perhaps it is the fog that comes in the form of a sickness or death of someone important to you. Perhaps the fog comes without anything bad happening; it is the fog that comes when life or business changes in some great or thrilling but unexpected way. Perhaps it is a fog that rolled in through no fault of your own; the economy changed or a stalled supply chain required the re-thinking of everything. Or perhaps your life or company or career is demanding that you make some really important decision when the path forward isn't clear.

There are hundreds of other ways we could find ourselves suddenly skiing into the fog. Perhaps you are lacking clarity in some area of your personal or professional life right now.

Tips from skiing in the fog actually can point us to a range of questions that could help us navigate these situations thoughtfully. Even if you are not in the midst of fog in some area of your life, the following will give you a sense of how we coach.

If You Find Yourself in the Fog

There are at least nine good tips for skiing in fog. Eight come from a blog post on an English website called Snowplaza.co.uk. These tips include: (1) Regulate Your Speed; (2) Stay Flexible; (3) Ski Only when You are Able to Fully Concentrate; (4) Stay on Trails that are Not Overly Challenging to You; (5) Stick Together; (6) Pay Attention to Your Senses (but Know that they May Fail You); (7) Move to Areas with Better Visibility; (8) Use the Correct Ski Goggles; and (9) Ski Closer to the Edge of the Trail.

Let's translate each of these tips into questions that might be helpful for you to consider in the midst of your own fog:

(1) When skiing in the fog, skiing too fast can dramatically increase danger.

• What pressures do you feel, right now, that make you sense that there is an urgency for you to move, decide, or act?

• If felt pressures do exist, in what ways are these pressures real vs. imagined?

• In your situation right now, what risks might you face if you move too fast?

• What are ways you might be able to slow down until you have more clarity?

• How do the risks of moving too quickly right now compare to the risks of moving too slowly?

(2) When skiing in the fog, a flexible stance is even more important than normal. It helps bring stability when you hit unexpected bumps.

• In what ways could increased flexibility help you in the midst of this particular situation?

• What unexpected bumps or obstacles do you anticipate possibly emerging while you are in this moment of fog? How might you best prepare to react to them?

(3) Experienced skiers who know what they are doing can navigate different slopes easily and without a ton of concentration, when the conditions are clear. In the fog, everything changes.

• In what ways have you been operating without full focus, ways that the fog now has brought into specific relief?

• What things in your life or career might distract you from keeping your eye on the ball right now?

• What are some ways you might best navigate or remove some of those distractions?Put differently, what changes could you make to help you fully focus or concentrate on the issue at hand?

• If you cannot remove those things you've identified as distractions, how can you mitigate them?

(4) Many skiers like to push themselves by taking on challenging slopes. Wise skiers know that heavy fog should curtail that desire.

• What low-hanging fruit (or easy steps) could you go after right now that might lead to greater clarity?

• How could the right information or data help make it less dangerous to pursue a particular path at this moment?

• What specific information or data would you need to increase clarity?

(5) When skiing in the fog, staying with others skiers can protect us by being there if we get in trouble, have a bad fall, or leave the piste in a dangerous place.

• In what ways might it be dangerous for you to walk through this process alone?

• How could other people be helpful in the midst of this moment?

• Who, specifically, could help you?

(6) When skiing in the fog, we should pay attention to our senses and instincts. But we should also be aware that they could lead us astray.

• What are your senses and instincts telling you, right now, about next steps?

• What possible dangers are there in following our instincts without confirmation from trusted sources?

• How might you seek confirmation about these instincts?

(7) Sometimes, when skiing in the fog, there are other parts of the mountain where the fog has cleared. Moving to the clear areas is an obvious solution to fog, of course.

• What are ways you might be able to move physically that might bring increased clarity into your situation?

• What are ways you might be able to move emotionally that might bring increased clarity into your situation?

• What are ways you might be able to move philosophically that might bring increased clarity into your situation?

(8) There are specific types of lenses for ski goggles that are made for flat lighting and that can actually help increase clarity. Other types of lenses will seem to make it worse.

• If money were no object, what sorts of equipment, staffing, or other resources could you acquire (buy, hire, rent, etc.) that could help provide clarity?

• Which of these would you prioritize?

• If there are resources from the list above that you are unable to acquire or put in place at the moment, how might you go about pursuing those?

(9) Most ski slopes have clearly marked boundaries. The problem is that they are often marked with small flags or indicators that are incredibly difficult to see in the fog. But skiing near the edge makes it more likely we'll see the boundary markers. If the boundary of a ski slope is defined by a tree line, staying close enough to that tree line can also help.

• What sorts of things exist that could help provide guidance for you in this moment?

• What obstacles exist that would keep you from accessing those things?

. . .

Okay. So if you are still reading at this point, at least one of the following is probably true: (1) you are in a fog of some kind in your own life; (2) you are not in a fog of some kind right now but were interested to see how we might coach someone in the midst of the fog; or (3) you are my mom.

If you are in the first camp, above, I hope these questions were helpful. These, of course, are questions we may or may not ever ask—our questions are driven by your unique situation. We might spend an entire session on just a few of these, and we might go in another direction entirely. But the goal would be to increase awareness and insight so we could define some measurable and specific next steps for you to take as a result of the time together. Then, in a future session, we'd explore, together, what progress was made toward those steps.

If you are in the second camp, above, I hope you can see the value of having someone ask you good questions; someone who is committed to helping you process your thoughts in meaningful ways.

If you are in the third camp, I love you mom.

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